When I was reading “Think and Grow Rich” by Napoleon Hill, I recall the concept of having a mastermind group. I don’t remember the specifics now as it’s been sometime since I’ve read the book but it revolves around surrounding yourself with like-minded people who share you goals and aspirations to come together to fellowship, learn from and support one another towards the common goal or aspiration.

It sounds a lot like networking and mentoring doesn’t it?

In your own journey towards financial freedom, it’s helpful to identify which group can function as a form of mastermind group. People who have the interest and passion for all things related to financial freedom and the willingness to explore the principles of living within your means, to save and invest as well as to grow and protect your means.

Your Own Financial Freedom Mastermind Group

The closest thing that I have to a mastermind group or two actually is La Papillon’s Cbox. The other is my close group of three buddies who are my ex-colleagues and now good friends for life.

Finding and sustaining a mastermind group is not easy. The people should be those you are comfortable to interact with because you would be sharing topics quite close to your heart, that of financial freedom. It is interesting to note the dynamics of different groups that I count as my mastermind group.

LP’s cbox is an fun group made up of people from all different backgrounds but similar interest in achieving financial freedom or at least doing well in the stocks, bonds and for some, even foreign exchange markets. I learn a lot from them as some of them are technically financially free where their passive income exceeds their earned income, while others like myself are working our way towards achieving that target.

Some cbox participants are parents, some are single and the age group ranges from undergraduates to senior professionals. It is the diversity of views of the friends here that make it interesting. I have actually met some of these people in person though not all of them. You get to hear about the pros and cons of different approaches to capital allocation, specific stock picks as well as the success and failures when investing in the equity markets.

I learn a lot from everyone in this group. I remember my secondary four Confucian Ethics studies where one of the Confucian scholars did note that we can learn from anyone and everyone.

Gentlemen’s Club

The other group is my close buddies whom I’ve known for 15 years or so. We have matured together from fresh working graduates to professionals in our fields with families. We share common reference point being Generation X where we have lived through the Asian financial crisis in 1997/98, dot com fallout in 2000/01 and SARS 2003 as well as the global financial crisis in 2008/09.

We also share and learn from one another the different risk appetites in growing our network. One among us is more into property investments, I am more into equities and the other two are more balanced between equities and deposits.

The honesty we share helps us learn from each other’s mistakes as well as to see why we have the type of risk profiles that we exhibit when it comes to portfolio allocation.

Both these groups have enriched my own understanding of myself as an investor/speculator and have also allowed me to connect with like-minded people where I know the journey towards financial freedom is not only mine to undertake. Others have embarked on this journey as well. Together there is a common goal we are striving for and it helps to have company to share our thoughts and feelings as we walk along this journey.

What type of mastergroup or support group do you have in your journey towards financial freedom?

Do you think it will help or hinder you in your quest towards financial freedom?

Share with Panzer in the comments section.

Be well and prosper.

Even as the calendar year 2011 draws inexorably towards a close with two months plus left before 31 December beckons, I realise that if I do nothing now, I will end the year with a realised returns of 4.5%.

In fact, I should not buy any more equities now and take bigger positions on the market because most of my returns will come from dividends — truly a form of passive income.  The more I trade or try speculative punts, the more I risk losses on capital due to market moves south in tandem with the general global negative outlook over European debt problems and possibility of US and world slowdown or even recession in 2012.

Is doing nothing a strategy?

Do or Do Not, There is No “Try”

This quote from Yoda of “Star Wars” reminds us that sometimes we have to take decisive action or sometimes we have to refrain from doing anything. At this point in time, I am about 30% in cash and 70% in equities. I am comfortable with this level because dividends will accrue even if I take no new positions.

In fact, the temptation is to try to squeeze a higher return by risking more capital in the market in line with trying to time market moves. My own internal benchmarks (though set at a fairly realistic and not overly ambitious target) have been met. Thus, as the fund manager of Panzer Funds, I have met my key performance indicator and extract some management fee for paying myself for the investment calls I’ve made throughout 2011.

To do more is to risk capital losses. My returns won’t make me rich. Neither do they make me financially free at this point in time, but they have at least mitigated the impact of inflation against my net worth. That itself is important because the next best alternative is currently returning a paltry 1% or less in “risk-free” fixed deposits (for the first $50k).

My main stream of income to build up investible net-worth to power-up my passive income still comes from my career. As the year-end draws nears, I’ll definitely enjoy some of this passive income as a small reward and to motivate myself to achieve better returns next year.

Multiple-Sources of Income and “Compulsion”

After reading Robert Allen’s “Multiple Streams of Income” and whilst reading Felix Dennis’ “How to Get Rich” book, I realise that growing one’s means beyond earned income is really critical in moving towards achieving financial freedom. The ability to execute good ideas into a sustainable business is critical. I am particularly intrigued by how Felix Dennis uses the term “compulsion” to be rich vs. “desire” to be rich as one of the key differentiating factors on what separates those who are rich are those who are not.

In some ways, I realise that my own journey towards financial freedom has to achieve the status of “compulsion” for me to succeed in my journey. Thus, my habits of recording my expenses, of making sure I live within my means will continue no matter what my level of net-worth achieved.

Increasingly, I am opening up interesting doors towards learning more about funding start-ups with a view of participating in their growth and benefitting like a venture capitalist. This learning would help me identify the key success factors and to hone that ability to gauge if a venture could potentially be a multi-bagger with the right funding, mentorship and partnerships.

In terms of the market, doing nothing i.e. not actively taking positions would mitigate unnecessary exposures to risk.  However, I should take this time to review my life-list, to learn more about being a venture capitalist and to enhance my abilities to generate more income to invest in Panzer Funds for ultimate goal of being financially free.

Are you doing nothing or going to be doing something for the last two plus months of 2011?

Share with Panzer in the comments section.

Be well and prosper.

It’s the last three months for calendar year 2011. For some if your organisations have hit substantially the key performance indicators set at the beginning of the year, it’s time for staff to clear leave and set aside some down time to recharge, rejunvenate and to refresh.

For others, they may have to push harder at work, business or personal lives to achieve the goals they set out at the start of 2011.

Whatever is the reason, the coming of the end of year in the next 1-2 months heralds the mood for retrospection and reflection.

What have we achieved in 2011?

What do we want to pursue in 2012?

What will the future hold for us and how have we managed our time on the present and the past?

Busy is good

Work-wise, the ironic thing is that things are getting busier towards the year-end partly because I am pushing out some initiatives within my department to do new projects and initiatives to prepare my team for 2012. Hence, we are laying the groundwork now to be a better performing team in 2011.

On the personal front, I am pursuing my class 2B motorcycle licence at a fairly relaxed pace as it is really more for learning the skills as well as being exposed to handling a different vehicle. After my class 2B, I will likely either continue with my Thai language learning or perhaps pick up conversational Korean because of my recent interest in Korean popular culture.

I would also try to enhance my physical fitness routine as I’m averaging two jogging sessions per week instead of the ideal three to even four sessions. A colleague of mine commented half-in-jest that I put on weight so I’m taking it as feedback that I need to ramp up my exercise regime and watch my diet.

Returns for calendar year 2011

Financially, if I do nothing from now until end of 2011, my realised returns on my portfolio for the year will be around 4.5%. It beats my internal benchmark of 2 x fixed deposits rates but lags slightly behind inflation. Overall, I think it’s a decent result because the market has been very volatile in the last 3 months and I’ve become less of speculator and more of a value investor. I still occasionally punt for fun but only on very small amounts.

My blogging updates may get less frequent going forward as I realised that I should focus on my time on building up skills and knowledge that will help increase my earned income as well as passive income. At the same time, I am growing the portfolio of my work assignments partly to add more value to my job as well as to learn new skills doing so.

How will you be spending your time on the fourth quarter of calendar year 2011?

Share with Panzer in the comments section.

Be well and prosper.

As part of my strategy to learn more about how corporate annual general meetings are held to beef up my corporate governance experience, I have started making it a point to attend annual general meetings (AGMs) of the companies that I have invested.

So far, I have attended last year’s DBS and SPH annual general meetings and they were useful exercises in seeing how different blue-chip companies conducted their annual general meetings.

Also, one of my targets is to position myself to be experienced and qualified to become an independent director of a listed company when I am near to retirement age as this could potentially provide a second “career” of sorts when my career as an internal auditor may plateau at some stage near the official retirement age in 20+ years’ time.

Key Highlights of the Singapore Exchange Ltd AGM

I won’t repeat the details of the proceedings as they are detailed in the SGX announcements. The CEO’s (Mr. Magnus Bocker) speech is given here while all resolutions tabled at the SGX AGM as well as the extra-ordinary general meeting (EOGM) held immediately after the AGM were passed.

IT Investments and New Areas of Growth

The key initiatives that struck me from the CEO’s speech was that SGX has invested significantly in its REACH IT related initiatives and these investments in IT infrastructure would be yielding new revenue streams going forward. It was interesting to also note that SGX’s revenue is diversified to some extent in that equities trading and related fees which is adversely affected by decline in market volume under current conditions is not the only source of income for the company. Its derivative business is growing in volume and it has seen new members (brokerages) signing up with the exchange.

High Frequency Trading and Circuit Breakers

The Exchange was also moving towards high frequency trading and it was mentioned that the velocity of our market in relation to market capitalisation was about 60% well lower than 200% of European bourses and 400% for NYSE. Hence, SGX was moving to facilitate this but would implement the rules, regulations and “circuit breakers” before allowing this to happen. The CEO talked about a 12 month or so timeframe for this to happen so we may see the start of such high frequency trading occur perhaps in the following financial year.

The first resolution was held up for quite a while because one of the shareholders asked about circuit breakers to be implemented as well as querying the SGX on some dubious market transactions near close of market on specified counters. One other shareholder was harping on why SGX needed 48 hours notice for appointment of proxies when the Companies Act did not require such notification but the company secretary Ms. Joyce Fong explained that almost all companies had this requirement in the articles of association and it was more for ease of administration as they needed to cut-off the date of appointment of proxies as their internal audit needed to verify the proxies information prior to the AGM.

Holding AGMs in other countries

Another shareholder asked if SGX would be doing something about companies listed in SGX that had their AGMs outside of Singapore. The CEO and Chief Regulatory Officer Ms. Yeo Lian Sim answered that they were looking into this as currently companies listed on SGX which were domiciled in other countries still had to hold their AGMs in Singapore unless their laws required them to do so in their country of domicile.

Decline in EPS

Another member also queried the acting CFO (Co-President) MR Muthukrishnan Ramaswami on the declining trend of earnings per share which the acting CFO explained was not due to dilution of shares but more due to overall earnings impacted by the worsening market conditions especially affecting the trading volumes for equities as well as capital expenditure (CAPEX) for IT related initiatives which occurred in “Steps” or were lumpy over the years.

ASX-SGX Merger Failure

Members also questioned the wisdom of the ASX merger and spending $18m on related expenses but the Chairman Mr. Chew Choon Seng explained that hindsight was 20-20 and that both boards of SGX and ASX as well as managements of both entities thought that the value-creation from the merger would benefit both companies’ shareholders. However, the CEO explained that the merger happened during a period of political change in Australia which eventually resulted in the failure of the merger due to political pressure.

Overall, the Chairman handled the meeting well and was fairly open with shareholders even if some of them went somewhat off tangent in their questions that were not directly related to the resolution to be voted. It was interesting to note that during the AGM, electronic polling was carried out so shareholders were able to vote for every resolution.

However the number of active votes held by shareholders at the AGM amounted to less than 3 million shares against 190+ million held by institutional shareholders so the outcome of the resolutions were never in doubt as the shareholders voting could not do much.

Eye-Opening Experience

It was an eye-opening experience to listen to the key management (CEO and acting CFO) as well as the Chairman explaining the context to what we could read for ourselves in the financial statements of the company. One could also see if the CEO and Chairman were at ease or put off by the questions from the shareholders. I thought that both acquitted themselves well and shareholders queries were addressed and some leeway was given even when the questions were not directly relevant to the resolutions.

Whilst I know that my vote counts for very little, it still counted because instead of using a show of hands method, the resolutions were decided based on a poll which put in record the number of shares voting or against each resolution.

Retail investors made their unhappiness with the Chairman’s renumeration of $750,000 plus car and driver with almost half of those active and present in the AGM voting against it. But the resolution was carried since the retail investors clout was not substantial.

I feel that attending AGMs are a way to gain fundamental analysis knowledge about a company. While management and Chairman of the company may be biased in trying to spin a positive story, their explanations and answers to queries help put some context into the numbers and activities of the company involved.

All in all, taking leave to attend the AGM was worth my time and anyway, I have to clear my last year’s leave by end of December 2011 or it would lapse.

I know Musicwhiz attends AGMs, does any other one of readers here attend AGMs?

Share your experience with Panzer in the comments section.

Be well and prosper.

The current market turmoil has seen my stock portfolio’s value decrease as prices of even blue-chips stocks go south. It appears to be 2008-2009 again for many investors. What can we do, how can we overcome the challenges of seeing our portfolios dwindle with the threat of global economic recession threatening growth over the horizon?

Not Having All Your Eggs in One Basket

The key take-away I got from the 2008/09 global financial crisis was not to put all my eggs in one basket. I.e. I should not invest almost all of my investible net worth in one asset class which in my case is stocks and shares or equities.

That painful lesson has served me well today because I am currently about 70% invested in equities and 30% in cash and cash equivalents. This allows me to ride out the market downturn as most of my portfolio is invested in SPH and UOB that are very sound businesses and continue to pay dividends at a yield higher than what I can receive from investing in fixed deposits.

The other thing I learnt in my journey towards financial freedom is that capability development is very critical in growing oneself. We are still the biggest asset in our portfolio as our ability to generate earned income during our economically productive lives is the main cash generator that allows us to build investible savings for passive income.

Continuous learning of new skills, abilities and relevant experiences allows one to develop capability to navigate tomorrow’s changed situations mainly because we have the capacity and skillsets to handle new situations and tasks arising from work.

The Markets are Not Everything

Nicholas Nassim Taleb’s point of not using the stock market as a repository of wealth rings true during periods of market downturn like what we are seeing today. As I was watching the Korean entertainment series “Invincible Youth” on youtube, it rekindled my interest and dream that one day, I would like to transit to a lifestyle where I can grow some of my own food and also provide eco-tourism activities on a farm or rural community. Living in the City-State of Singapore does not allow one to have many opportunities to experience rural life unless one travels to Kranji area or out of Singapore to neighbour countries smaller towns and rural communities.

I would like eventually, when my daughter is old enough to be independent, to settle down in some low cost Asean country in a smaller town to basically live a simple lifestyle based on sustainable living supplemented with the occasional creature comforts. In order to achieve this, I would need to keep myself fit and healthy to be able to continue to work the land for some basic subsistence.

The stock market is not everything, I would rather convert my paper assets to real world assets such as a farm with a water source and arable food, livestock and live a simple life till I depart from this world.

What is your own strategy for dealing with the current bad market?

Share with Panzer in the comments section.

Be well and prosper.

One of my life goals that I’ve listed in my life list in 2009 was to obtain a class 2B motorcycle licence. That list was written in April of 2009, more than 2 years plus ago. It is timely to revisit that list as there has been some changes to it since I last wrote it.

I started my new journey to challenge myself by registering for the class 2B motorcycle licence at one of the training centres in Singapore. The road will be long and challenging as one needs to clear quite a number of theory lessons even before one can book the practical lessons to get hands-on training with the motorcycle.

Why Challenge Yourself

One of the interesting and thought provoking personal development books I’ve read is “The Art of Learning” by Josh Waitzkin. The book is about the personal journey of Josh Waitzkin who was an American chess prodigy who managed to achieve peak performance in fields that are vastly different – chess and competitive “pushing hands” or tai ji chuan martial arts. His striving for and achievement of great performance in different fields reflects the pursuit of the renaissance man concept, one who is interested in the world and can see how there is commonality in the pursuit of excellence in different disciplines.

The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Waste

Challenging oneself in learning new skills is to widen one’s life experiences and to grow as a person. My pursuit of financial freedom has led to to the realisation that I need to also invest in myself as person to grow my capabilities. I become more “valuable” to the market place because I can add value to the world around me. And the way to do so is to learn useful skills that can be used for leisure (i.e. travel to ASEAN countries where motorcycles are a cheap and convenient form of transportation).

I also see learning new skills as listed in my life list as a way to experience life more fully because I can engage in life in more varied ways. Riding a motorcycle is a useful life skill that can enhance my lifestyle as I would be able to operate another class of vehicle. The older I get, the more I realise that my time on this earth is not forever and that if I do not learn to ride a motorcycle in my 40s, it would get progressively more difficult in my 50s or later.

Some of you may think this is a mid-life crisis that I’m going through. Perhaps it is. I am not learning to ride a bike with the ultimate aim of zooming off to the sunset in a Harley Davidson, but rather, I get excited about learning a new practical skill that I can use for travelling in the future and could come in useful should I choose to retire in a low-cost country 20-25 years down the road.

Looking at my life-list reminds me that there are many things I want to see and do and the available time for me to do them becomes shorter each year that I grow older.

I have posted this article also to act as a way to motivate myself to achieve the class 2B licence. I will try to achieve this with the best of my ability.

What goals in your own life-list are you thinking of achieving in the near future?

Share with Panzer in the comments section.

Be well and prosper.

Other decisions are harder, e.g. should I cut loss on my paper losses or hold on to a stock? Should I set my asset allocation at 50% equities to 50% cash or 70% equities to 30% cash or 100% cash and 0% equities.

Being paralysed and afraid of making a decision sometimes inhibits our growth as a person because we do not want to accept the consequences of our own decisions.

Life can only be lived looking forward

Steve Jobs’ commencement address that talked about how we can only connect the dots looking backwards reinforces the concept that life can only be lived looking forward. No-one can predict what the future will be. Will the stock market continue its bearish trend and stocks become cheaper? Or will there be a rebound that sees stock prices go up.

The reality is no-one knows, but we should know enough to be able to take a decision and live with the consequences. Currently I have 70% invested in equities and 30% in cash. I am comfortable with this level because I do not have any major cash needs for the next 6 to 7 years and the 30% cash buffer allows me sufficient flexibility in meeting cash outflows if they materialise in the short-term.

The more I started to invest in equities, the more I realised that reading about a company in its annual reports as well as analysts reports were well and good. But summoning the courage to act on the conviction to buy/sell was not as easy as it seems. It takes willpower, a bit of decisiveness to make a buy/sell decision and stick with it according to one’s investment objectives.

I’ve become more decisive now compared to when I first started investing in equities in 2003. I also realised that I needed to live with buyers’/sellers’ remorse when I bought and sold and prices moved lower and higher almost immediately after I made the decision. I continue to learn the lesson that one should act on one’s conviction and be prepared to live with the consequences.

We can only live life looking forward and making decisions based on what information we have and how prior experience had molded us.

How has being decisive or indecisive helped or hindered you in your own quest for financial freedom?

Share with Panzer in the comments section.

Be well and prosper.

My current interest in the Korean girls’ pop group Girls Generation (SNSD) has led me to searching for their music videos as well as reality programmes subbed in English on youtube. Those who follow SNSD know that one of the earliest documentaries about them is “Girls Go To School” (GGTS) where it features the group’s inception, pre-debut and debut into the Korean market by SM Entertainment.

As I watched the documentary, I could not help from being inspired and awed by the amount of hard work put into their performances through practising their dance moves and singing as well as acting for the music videos and live and recorded shows. To be the best, you need a combination of talent, luck and sheer hardwork to see you through the end of your objective.

Working Hard Like SNSD

I can relate to what the girls went through in the GGTS documentary where the group of them being 17 and 18 years old are being put into a rigorous schedule that sees them debuting as a pop group. Behind the scenes you start to understand how some of the members got into the SM Trainee scheme in their early teens to hone their talents in singing, dancing, acting and hosting.

When I was 18 going to 19, I was drafted into the Singapore Armed Forces to serve my national service as a soldier. It was a time to work hard although unlike SNSD I could not choose not to enlist. But I can see how the tough schedule and regimes that one goes through at 18 does shape one’s future to some extent.

The army did teach me more about physical endurance and about enduring to see myself through my objective. In the case of NS, it was sacrificing your own comfort to fulfil your duties to the country as a soldier. I credit that experience to making me more thankful for the opportunity to study in NTU and to do well enough to secure a good job in my starting career.

Working hard is common at the start of any new endeavour. We need to put in the hours or the 10,000 hours rule of thumb popularised by Malcolm Gladwell to become competent and successful in the thing that we do. I can see how SNSD’s individual members’ efforts must have well exceeded 10,000 to allow them to perform as a group at such levels.

When we first begin to understand the concept of financial freedom, the beginning is the hardest, trying to internalise the principles of living within your means, saving and investing, growing and protecting your means.

Working Smart Smart Like SNSD

For some of the criticism that SM Entertainment gets for pushing their performers hard, one can understand the need to maximise the opportunities for commercialising one’s popularity. SNSD are into selling music albums and concert and live/recorded performances as well as commercial endorsements for products and services. They are into MCing and hosting events as well as dee-jaying and acting in Korean dramas.

The entertainment game is largely a popularity game that is fickle and ruthless. One strikes while the iron is hot to earn as much as one can while one’s star is shining brightly. As the meteoric rise towards popularity is fleeting and temporary, no-one knows what the future holds.

I realise that as I grow older, I can work hard but won’t be able to work as physically hard as I could when I was in my 20s or early 30s. Age catches up with all of us even if we can mitigate its effects by sensible diet, exercise and stress management. We trade age for experience and it is that experience that allows us to work smarter to get more things done in lesser time. To be efficient, economical and most importantly, to be effective.

To be financially free requires one to be smart in either increasing our available investible capital or to increase the returns we can get for it within acceptable risks. Working smart and avoiding being wiped out by market losses become even more critical when your investible capital grows to be of a significant size.

What phase of working hard or working smart are you in your own journey towards financial freedom?

Share with Panzer in the comments section.

Be well and prosper.

The Korean (K) wave or Hallyu of popular culture in terms of K-drama and K-pop culture reflects the globalisation of consumer taste in entertainment. The easy accessibility of music videos, television programmes and radio through the internet has allowed consumers who have a decent broadband internet access to tap onto the different genres of music, film and entertainment.

What has Hallyu have to do with financial freedom?

Interest in Hallyu

One of the key principles of financial freedom is to grow our means. For many of us, that means to develop ourselves through studying for a good education to get a good job or to embark on business to earn our incomes.

Earned income is still fundamentally the key driver of our investible savings. We can only start saving if our income exceeds our expenditures. The starting point of income generation typically is ourselves, i.e. we receive earned income from trading our waking hours to a trade, professional or business.

I started out watching youtube music videos a few years back and first discovered J-pop group SPEED which was enormously successful in their heyday. Since then, I’ve been consuming music videos through youtube of Thai, Japanese, English and Korean pop music groups. My current favourite is Girls’ Generation or SNSD – currently a very popular Korean 9 girl pop group that would be coming to Singapore early next year.

Their music is catchy but what strikes me the most is their synchronised dance choreography. As I started to watch their music videos and search for information about the group online, I discovered that they were featured in a documentary by Mnet called, “SNSD: Girls Going to School“.

It was a fascinating glimpse into the Korean entertainment industry where companies such as SM Entertainment are factories that manfacture pop idols for the consumer market. What struck me is how multi-talented the members of SNSD are. They are MCs, DJs, singers, dancers, models, actresses etc. all rolled into one. Some of them have been with the company as trainees since their early or mid teens. From the documentary you can see that it’s a tough life, involving lots of practices and long hours of events, activities and performances.

You Have More Than One Talent

I’d like to believe that we can learn from the Korean pop factory style in developing talent. I.e. although SNSD was put together mainly as a pop group, the members also work as hosts, MCs and DJs even when they are in the group.

While not all of us are talented in music, dance and singing or are born with good looks, we all have talents. The challenge is to groom the obvious ones but also look out for talents that can be developed or identified.

I started out and continue to work as an internal auditor for my career. But in my career progress, I’ve discovered that I have some IT skills arising from an adolescent boys’ interest in computer gaming. I’ve also discovered that I could do some public speaking and make presentations because one of my jobs as an IT auditor and security consultant required me to do training. I went into toastmastering as a hobby after I started to do some training.

It was from toastmasters that I’ve learn to properly MC (be a master of ceremony) for events and also learnt how to prepare and go for prepared and impromptu speech contests.

I realise that my own skills as an internal auditor developed more because I was exposed to different areas i.e. corporate governance in non-profits, IT audit, security and governance beyond the traditional scope of internal controls, compliance and value for money for internal auditing. I also picked up some skills as a non-executive director from volunteering to be on the board of a non-profit for 7-8 years or so.

Finding your own SNSD

My takeaway from watching SNSD’s documentaries (the other is Factory Girl) is that we can learn to build up diverse talents and make full use of the spectrum of skills that we have and some we may not even know we have. The key is to try to get out of our comfort zone once in a while and try something new. You never know if you can do it until you try.

So far, my Thai language foray as started getting me interested in learning other languages such as Japanese and Korean to allow me to better enjoy J/K popular culture but also to invest in myself to be able to function better as a future tourist to those countries and even other possibilities.

What have you done recently to invest in yourself?

Share with Panzer in the comments section.